Anime Rebirth

Review - Saint Seiya

Review by Roriconfan

Historical Value: 10, Rewatchability Value: 4, Average Value: 7
Saint Seiya is indeed the father of all Shonen fighting anime and it was the best thing around at the time it was aired. Many otakus were raised with it, including the creators of today’s famous Shonen series. I have no reason for not giving it a 10 in historical value. Rewatchability though, is another story. Just keep reading.

Enjoyment: 4
Here comes the first issue. I personaly watched Saint Seiya now that I’m way over my teens and AFTER viewing Dragon Ball Z, Naruto, Bleach, One Piece and the like. What was my impresion of it? Bad! Everything felt fake, shallow and stupid. Because all its good aspects are INDEED being shoveled at us in all similar series thereafter. What was original back then, is clished today. So, I DIDN’T enjoyed it much. All the fighting scenes and the characters are simple and superficial in comparisson with what we get today. So, leaving sentimental values aside, it is boring by today’s standarts.

Character Backdrop Variety: 10, Character Fleshing Out: 8, Average for Characters: 9
Almost every character has a backdrop story, including the secondary ones and most minor villains. This is a worthy note, even by today’s standarts. Most series don’t try to spice the secondary cast and Saint Seiya showed a lot more respect than most in this department. I rate a 10 in this section.

And now for the bad part. All backdrop stories and character motives are very simple. Avenge/defeat/save someone, find/destroy/win something, prove your power/resolve/point. All these elements are identical in all Shonen. And like in all Shonen, they are not enough to flesh out a character properly. Oh, sure, in terms of the Shonen genre they are great. But in terms of really unique and interesting characters, they are not. Watching the same archetypes repeating in all the series gets boring after the 1000th time.

Ohtoriakio insists that the characters get a lot more realistic after episode 35. The scriptwriters sure took their time in developing them. By trusting his opinion (since I skipped a lot of episodes, out of loss of interest) I give them an 8 in this section for standing out in the lot.

Story Variety: 5, Story Convincingness: 3, Myth Allusions: 8, Average for Story: 5
The story is character-driven, as it usually is in Shonen. Someone wants to accomplish something (Avenge/defeat/save someone, find/destroy/win something, prove his power/resolve/point) and faces others who think differently and want to stop him. This is not bad by itself but it really sucks if you try to reason the way it is presented.

Almost all battles are taking place in tournament arenas or arena-like locations. Wherever the characters go, everything feels like an arena, made just so they can come and fight in it. Even high angle views of the wide areas the characters have to cross look like linear obstacle routes, filled with incohesive landmark features that resemble those in tv action games, like the American Gladiators or the Knights and Warriors. In a few words, the world in which the story takes place is fake. It is made just for the fighting and nothing more. I rate a 5 in this section.

All the fuss about the war with the Gods for the salvation of humanity is just a poor excuse for endless fighting. I simply loathe the American-based ideal of mankind’s salvation being in the hands of a bunch of superhero teenagers. What are the rest of us good for, then? It felt too much like brain-dead teenagers measuring “who has the biggest (cosmo)”. I rate a 3 in this section.

The mythological allusions are always interesting to look at. I am Greek myself and I like seeing and hearing Greek names and myths in anime. The pronunciation of them was awful, the myths were debunked to resemble fairy tales but I still liked the whole idea. I rate an 8 in this section.

Animation Fluidity: 6, Artwork: 8, Average for Animation: 7
The animation is exactly as ohtoriakio described. Poor frame rate, jerky movement, lots of repeating footage during transformations and special attacks. Heck, I now understand why some describe this series as “the Shonen equivalent of Sailor Moon” (which I liked a lot more than Saint Seiya, despite being a guy). I rate a 6 in this section.

The character designs are indeed nice most of the time. But not so much the facial expressions or the body proportions; those felt one of the same. The Saint costumes are really cool to look at. It gets tiresome to watch all the men wearing animal-themed armors and all the women wearing revealing robes all the time. But in general, it is good in this section. I rate an 8.

Sound: 8
I agree with ohtoriakio in this section completely. More specifically, the intros kick ass! But I won’t go all the way to rate a 9.

Verdict
I regret to inform you that the patient has left us. But worry not, as his ideals keep living inside his descendants.